Evaluation Policy for the Use of Appeal Funds by Member Agencies

DEC Accountability Framework

Evaluation Policy for the Use of Appeal Funds by Member Agencies

1. Introduction:

The DEC, as the charity that raises the money from the public, needs to be able to demonstrate independent scrutiny of how the money was spent by the Member Agencies as there is no grant making process involved in the allocation of funds raised by the DEC to the Member Agencies.

The DEC Accountability Framework puts the onus on the Member Agencies, as leading international charities, to show how they perform successfully so the DEC has agreed the following evaluation policy

2. Policy Statement:

“As a condition of membership, DEC Member Agencies agree that they will commission and make available on their website an independent evaluation of their response to selected emergencies that have received DEC appeal funds”.

3. Evaluation Procedures:

  • For each appeal at least four of the DEC Member Agencies benefiting from an appeal will be asked by the Secretariat to commission and publish an independent evaluation of their response within one year of the DEC appeal being launched.
  • The choice of Member Agencies is informed by the need to evaluate a material amount of the appeal fund (more than 33%).
    The cycle of Member Agencies selected to undertake evaluations will be approved by the DEC Audit Committee on an annual basis.
  • “Independent” means contracted from individuals/companies which excludes permanent staff of the DEC Member Agency
  • “Publishing” means, as a minimum, posting the executive summary of the report on their own and ALNAP websites with any management response and making available on request the full report in line with the Member Agency’s own open information policy.
  • The scope and issues covered by the Terms of Reference of the evaluation would be ones judged relevant to the Member Agency but would need to include an assessment of the impact and cost effectiveness of the response and the following common elements:
  • the extent to which proposed objectives and outcomes had been achieved
  •  the extent to which the Code of Conduct standards and Sphere had been respected
  • the level of involvement of and accountability to beneficiaries
  • the extent that past lessons or recommendations had been fulfilled
  • The evaluation could be included as a budget line in DEC funded programmes over and above the 7% management levy up to a maximum of £20,000.

February 2009